WORLD
EU: Tax collection still lagging in Greece
Baku, December 18 (AZERTAC). Greece is failing to collect the tax it is owed and is in danger of missing key targets that need to be met to reduce the government`s staggering debt pile, the European Union warned on Monday.
An EU task force helping Greece overcome the financial crisis that brought it to the brink of bankruptcy said Athens still has trouble dealing with old, outstanding tax claims. With 2 months to go in 2012, it was still about a billion euros behind the EU target of recovering €2 billion ($2.6 billion).
In a report it said Greece made only 88 audits of large taxpayers, well short of a 2012 target of 300, and 467 of "high-wealth individuals," below a 1,300 target.
Overall, EU Vice President Olli Rehn said Greece was nevertheless tackling problems "with determination and resolve."
Greece has been surviving on rescue loans from its partners in the 17-country eurozone and the International Monetary Fund since 2010.
The continuing drop in Greek economic output, the agency argued, made it "unlikely" the country would be able to control its national debt "without further reduction on principal." That would mean that Greece`s existing creditors — mainly other euro governments and the IMF — would have to take a cut on their loans, something they have so far ruled out.
In Spain, where tax fraud is rampant, as much as €90 billion ($115 billion) is lost each year to tax fraud — the equivalent of the country`s national debt, according to Spain`s main tax inspectors` union.
Tax evasion of all types in Italy every year totals about €240 billion ($300 billion), or 15 percent of the country`s gross domestic product of €1.6 trillion ($2 trillion), tax police estimate. The sum amounts to more than a third of Italy`s yearly total receipts from tax — €676 billion ($860 billion), according to 2011 figures from Eurostat.